Ornithology
by Raven Catz
Summary: A study on the behavior of birds.
1. Chapter 1

It had been something of an unusual week. Granted, what passes as "usual" for Harold Finch and John Reese is not what counts for usual for most of the rest of us. It was quiet. It had been quiet for a few days. Long enough that Finch found himself more concerned about the lack of Numbers than the presence of them. Countless diagnostics had turned up nothing amiss in the Library, and now Finch found himself slipping into a very unusual mode indeed; boredom. He had thoroughly exhausted Bear (and his own right arm) with more games of fetch than he had previously thought possible, eventually just lazily dropping the ball down the tightly winding staircase and watching the massive dog tirelessly ascend and descend. He had finally resigned himself to stepping out into the blinking sunlight for a second cup of tea. He had made it perhaps two and a half blocks, thankful, for once, for his deliberately meditative pace amidst the bustle of New York traffic, before his ear caught the sharp, dissonant ringing of a payphone just up the block. Straightening slightly, he peered discreetly beyond the payphone's brushed steel shell as he picked up the receiver. As the Machine's coded message poured out of the receiver, the familiar rush of adrenaline invaded Finch's consciousness. Second cup of tea forgotten, he turned and began again in the direction of the Library.

* * *

"Katherine Corvis?" Reese was sitting on a sun-drenched bench in midtown, leafing disinterestedly through one of those pamphlets the Mormons hand out to unsuspecting strangers in subway stations.

"That's not her only name. This one has been a little difficult to track down. Her real name appears to have been Margaret Gulliver, she's 28 years old, and she grew up in Wisconsin. The last records I have for her with that name are from a police report in Chicago. Oh, and Mr. Reese…"

"What is it Finch?"

"She seems to have had a rather successful career in…" Finch hesitated slightly, despite himself.

"Finch?"

"Burlesque, Mr. Reese. She performed under an alias of some sort, a stage name." Finch was carefully taping up photos, one of a girl dressed in black, fresh faced and peering away from the camera. The other was the same girl, but might as well have been someone completely different at first glance. She wore a blue dress and feathers in her hair. Finch wasn't sure which iteration they would be searching for, and committed himself to studying both of them.

"What led to the name change? Jealous ex-boyfriend? Stalker fan?"

"She's the sole living witness to a triple homicide. Gang-related violence on the south side of Chicago. She was photographing children at an elementary school and, according to the police report, she was packing her car at the end of the day when it happened. Not even a whole block from the school."

Reese left the pamphlet on the arm of the bench and began walking down the street.

"There were two other witnesses, another photographer, and the school janitor. Both of them were tracked down and murdered before the trial could begin, so Ms. Corvis entered the witness protection program. Ironically, she was plucked from one urban jungle and tossed unceremoniously into another. It seems she's spent the last six months as a dog walker, and her Facebook page shows minimal activity."

"How do you expect me to find her on that, Finch?" Reese asked, his voice metered to mask any implication of impatience.

"Every day, at 3pm, she has coffee at the Starbucks two blocks down from you, on your left."

Reese looked at his watch. It was 2:52.

"Well, then, it looks like I've got time to stop for coffee. I'd bring you something, Finch, but by the time I get back, I'm sure it will be cold." At this, Reese merged into the steady stream of pedestrians flowing down the sidewalk, disappearing into his own form of anonymity.

* * *

Katherine Corvis was stooped over a notebook at one of the tiny steel tables at her favorite Starbucks. She would have preferred writing in an independent coffeehouse, like she used to in Chicago, but her roommate was a barista, and Kat was more than happy to benefit from her employee discount.

Her handwriting scrawled across page after page, just like it used to when she was still Maggie. The notebook cover was still faded and hanging on by a few fraying bits. She was still drinking her ubiquitous tall mocha, half a bagel slathered in cream cheese on a napkin to her right. Everything was exactly the same as it used to be, except for her name. Her name, and the fact that she no longer had anything to do with her life, except hang out in an endless string of coffeeshops, words pouring silently from her mind directly onto blank pages. All the distractions of her old life, of Maggie's life, were sharply curtailed. Her photo couldn't end up on Facebook, she couldn't even let her boyfriend know she was leaving for New York "for a few months".

A few months had turned into half a year at this point. She had slipped back into Illinois once since her departure, in a black sedan with tinted windows, to testify against the man she witnessed shooting three teenage boys in a Cicero alleyway. She was sequestered, and immediately flown back to New York after the fact. This exile wasn't what she had bargained for. It wasn't what she'd hoped it would be. Her frustration dug angry furrows into the pages of her notebook.

Somewhere behind her, the door swung open. Kat's eyes drifted slightly up toward the order counter, before dropping again. Six months of relative calm, but she still looked up every time anyone came through a door. Maybe Maggie had done that, too, but she couldn't remember. She had only become aware of her own hypervigilance since that afternoon in the school parking lot.

He was tall, wearing a suit. Just like the last three men to walk through the door. Her eyes dropped back to her notebook when she saw him grab his coffee and head for the only open table, conveniently within her line of sight. She was halfway through that mocha, which meant she intended to stick around awhile longer.

Suit Man picked up a copy of, of all things, The Chicago Tribune. Who read the Chicago papers in New York City? She wondered if he was a transplant, like her. He certainly drank his coffee slowly enough. After a while, she stopped taking notice of him, just as she had all the others.

45 minutes later, she was stepping off into the streets. If she noticed the man in the suit get up from his table as she passed him on the other side of the plate glass window, no one knew it.

Reese watched, seemingly detatchedly, as Katherine Corvis finished her coffee. She shook every last drop of precious caffeine from the cup before dropping it, unceremoniously, in the recycling bin. He waited only a moment, long enough to pencil in one last word on the Saturday Tribune word search, before rising to follow her.

After leaving the Starbucks, Katherine made a beeline for Bryant Park. They would be setting up the tents for fashion week within the next couple of weeks, and she would be forced to find another expanse of green to do her people-watching. She gazed across the lawn, thankful that the oppressive end-of-summer heat would soon be evaporating, and watched a couple clumsily flinging a Frisbee back and forth between them. She had been quite good at the game, once upon a time, but contented herself with watching the pair trotting defeatedly back and forth to retrieve the other's wild throws.

Reese seated himself in the shade this time, still peering over his copy of the Tribune. The Blackhawks were in first place again this season.

"Finch, she's just drifting." Reese murmured into the sports section.

"Stay with her Mr. Reese. I've found her private blog, and it seems she's somewhat… discontent with her arrangement here in the city."

"What are you thinking, Finch?"

"I'm thinking this situation might not be as black and white as we thought. By all accounts, she looks like she might be our victim, but she could be planning revenge on the people that forced her into hiding in the first place."

Reese sighed and folded his copy of the Tribune. When he looked up again, Katherine was gone.

"Finch, we may have a problem."

* * *

As Reese's luck would have it, just as he was peering across the park near the bench on which he had last seen her, a commotion arose directly behind him.

"Watch it, jerk!"

Katherine was perched on the curb, mid-step, a cyclist already darting midway through a red light, still ringing his bell and shouting obscenities back at her. Reese sighed.

"Nevermind, Finch. I've got eyes on her."

Reese proceeded to watch her window shop for everything from vintage hats to cheap cameras to stockings. She wandered, seemingly aimlessly, peering longingly into shop windows, fingers tracing the elaborate architecture. He watched her quietly drift to a bank to cash a check for $25. She loitered in front of the marquees of no less than seven theaters. And then Reese's phone buzzed.

"Followed. 6ft, white guy. Suit, salt & pepper hair."

Reese found himself just slightly offended at this description, not that he would have showed it.

"Emphasis on the pepper." He cracked the slightest smile at this amendment.

She hadn't broken her stride or changed directions, she didn't even try to lose him in the crowds of tourists. She just kept walking, resolutely.

"6th and 37th, headed down. If they need to search."

Reese picked up his pace slightly. It was time to wrap this up before it got messy.

"Finch, we've got a problem."

"What is it, Mr. Reese?" The familiar question crackled in his ear.

"She knows she's being followed."

"I trust you'll figure out an acceptable plan B, Mr. Reese."

"Already on it."

Kat wasn't looking back to see if the man in the suit was still there. He was. She knew, could sense it without having to look. She always knew. Maybe she wasn't surprised, given the circumstances. She didn't look down as she was texting. Maggie had done this before. She was certain she could manage. Something brushed past her shoulder.

"I'd ask to buy you coffee, but you finished one two hours ago." The man in the suit murmured in her ear.

"I could use a top-up." She replied, levelly.

"Good. So could I."

* * *

Kat conducted Reese in silence to a dimly lit café, the kind she might have preferred from the outset. The dark wood and crowded square tables made the already tiny space even more oppressively cramped. She selected a table at the very back of the café, half-obscured from view of the door.

"Alright. Now do you want to tell me what the hell you've been doing following me?" she asked, never averting her gaze from Reese's face.

The corners of Reese's lips suggested a smile at this, but he remained silent.

"You think I'm stupid. Do you really think I spend all my time gazing into plate-glass windows? I noticed you in the Starbucks. When I saw you again in the park, I thought maybe it was a coincidence, but there you were, in the reflection in all those windows. I hope you enjoyed looking at those cameras as much as I did, because I stopped at half those places just for you." She snarled.

"Maybe if you weren't so preoccupied with me, you might have seen that someone else was following you too, Katherine." Reese replied. He was pulling out a camera, flipping the display toward her, revealing two other men, both with short-cropped blonde hair and sporting suits not too dissimilar from the man across the table from her.

"…Who _are_ you?" she asked at length. "How do I know those aren't just a couple of businessmen off the street?"

The man in the suit began flipping through the photographs. In the reflection of the plate glass windows of the hat shop, the camera store, and marquees of at least three of the theaters, she was able to pick out the two blond gentlemen.

"I'm someone who helps people." He said, voice pitched low. "And in about 30 seconds, I'm going to need to help you."

"That still doesn't convince me that I should just trust you." Kat said uncertainly.

"Well, I imagine you should decide quickly, because they're between us and the door." Reese whispered.

"What?" Kat swiveled around, before Reese touched her forearm and her gaze flew back.

"I don't think you want to call that much attention to yourself right now." Reese intoned.

"Maybe that's just what you want me to think." She sighed, laying her head on the table.

"You've run out of time. Trust me?" The man in the suit stood up from the table. Kat looked back just in time to see him deflect a very large gun away from the general vicinity of her face. She watched the whole encounter as if it were in slow motion, until the man in the suit was pulling her out of the café by the arm, stumbling over the limbs of her two would-be assailants.

"What WAS that?" She asked incredulously, as they burst into the sunlight.

"That was my job." He replied.

"No, I mean what *was* that? Krav Maga? I always said I'd learn Krav Maga, but then, I was a little bit concerned about having to register my body as a weapon…"

Reese smiled in spite of himself.

"So… this is the part where you drop me off somewhere and I never see you again, right?" Kat asked, resentment creeping into her tone.

"No, Katherine. You're still in danger."

"Oh, I see how it is, you know my name, but I don't get yours?"

"You can call me Reese, and, no, I'm not just leaving you someplace, something tells me you've had enough of that lately."


	2. Chapter 2

Finch sat behind his bank of monitors, fingers flying across the keys, scanning through documents, hastily discarding the shell of a cover he had already constructed for Mr. Reese. They were a bit beyond that point now. Wheels turned in his head, trying to figure out a way to keep unobtrusive eyes on Miss Corvis without her astute knowledge. Throughout this, he found himself periodically waving away a wriggling Bear, who was persistently presenting him with everything from a leash to a tennis ball to a first-edition copy of _The Wizard of Oz_. And then it hit him. His eyes drifted up from the monitors, and he turned and looked down at Bear.

"Would you like to go for a walk?" he asked. Bear whined and thumped his tail on the tile floors.

* * *

Reese had hastily relocated Kat from the café to an uptown diner, well away from the neighborhoods she usually spent her time wandering.

"Mr. Reese, I've had an idea, but I'm going to need a little time to implement it. Stay where you are for the moment, and wait for my call." Finch's voice crackled in Reese's ear.

"Your…call? Finch, don't you think that's a little old school?" Reese murmured under his breath.

"Who you talking to?" Kat asked, peeking over the edge of the colossal, laminated menu in her hands. Reese responded with a chilly gaze, and her eyes dropped back to the 70's-era photographs of eggs, toast, and blueberry pancakes.

"You'll understand shortly, Mr. Reese." Finch replied, before terminating his end of the connection.

Finch sometimes allowed Reese's interactions with others to continue quietly in his ear, particularly when he wasn't in the Library to keep tabs on their actual whereabouts. This was one of these occasions, though he was largely tuning them out. He smiled slightly to himself at the sound of this girl's voice, ordering the eggs benedict. They were his favorite. At least she had good taste.

As they waited for their plates to arrive, Reese once again regarded Kat over the rim of his glass.

"I'm guessing, once they sent you here, the last thing you thought you'd be doing was running from men with guns." He intoned, quietly.

"Well… I thought that might be the case initially, but it was more like delusions of grandeur. I've been here six months, and everything's been quiet. Until today."

"Did you ever see either of those men before?"

"No." Kat replied. "I'm sorry I didn't believe you at first."

"You were being cautious. That's good."

"I'm always wavering between caution and recklessness." Kat smiled, reaching for her water glass. Reese nodded, he knew the feeling all too well.

"I guess I'm less reckless now…" Kat added, almost an afterthought. "I used to have nightmares about… about what happened back in Chicago. After a while, they faded. I started feeling like me again. But…" she trailed off.

"But what, Katherine?"

"But I'll never really be me again. I'm someone else now, I guess." She picked at the already chipped copper nail polish on her fingers. "Literally and figuratively. There are so many things from my old life that I wish I could do… Reese, if you catch these guys, do you think I can go back?"

"To Chicago?" Reese asked.

"Well… There's really nothing for me in Chicago now." Kat had stopped looking at Reese and was fiddling with the thin paper placemat in front of her. If she thought about it, she could still picture the layout of her old apartment. She was trying to focus on the material parts, but the faces of the people she'd left behind just kept intruding.

"I just want to be part of a community who understands me again. Doing what I do now is nice. I get to talk to people… I get to play with a lot of dogs. My roommate, Mallory, she's great. But there's this… this rift. She has no idea who I used to be. Who I am. And I'm forbidden to tell her. There's this whole life I lived, and that person is dead now, and I'm left to mourn all alone."

Reese said nothing, continuing to regard her in silence.

"Is that crazy? That I can tell you that?" She asked, at length.

"I don't think so. You've had to keep it to yourself for long enough."

"Do you want to know the worst part?" She asked, sipping her water. "I did it because I was a coward. The other two witnesses were killed before they could testify, and the police came to me and told me that they wanted to send me away, where I would be safe. They told me it would be safer for my family, my friends, if no one knew where I was going. For all I know, everyone I've ever known thinks I'm dead. And it's because I was a coward. I wanted to keep them safe. I wanted to keep _me_ safe. I didn't know that would mean giving up everything that had made me, me. I think about it all the time, but no one will ever understand that gulf that stretches between the parts of my life, and I'm afraid that's going to mean I'm all alone"

Her insight may have impressed Reese somewhat, but somewhere, on the other side of a phone line, Finch had frozen to the spot as she had begun to speak, lips tense and thoughts trawling his own memories. The truth of the matter was that he knew perfectly well about the rift she spoke of, the line between the living and the dead, and he knew how achingly, unfairly lonely that it could be. After a few moments, Bear's tugging at the end of his leash pushed Finch out of his thoughts, and he quickly ended Reese's transmission and returned to the issue at hand.

Kat and Reese allowed conversation to lapse as plates were heaped in front of them. Kat hadn't had proper diner fare in who knows how long, and she found the eggs benedict, with their accompanying mound of hashbrowns mouthwatering. Reese, on the other hand, knew well that his job was to observe and protect, and no one could be expected to protect with salty French-fry fingers. He continued to warily scan the room and the view from the half-shuttered windows over a bowl of minestrone soup.

Not more than three bites in, Kat's phone began to ring. She fumbled around her purse for it for a moment, hoping against hope she hadn't forgotten about some last-minute client or other, and racing to answer before her incessantly chipper ringtone reached its end. She didn't notice that, at the same moment, Reese's own phone was quietly buzzing in his pocket.

Reese, on the other hand, did notice, and took his companion's momentary distraction as a cue to subtly check it. The number that was calling Kat wasn't registered, and so he routed the call, unnoticed, into his earpiece.

"Hello?" Kat asked, trying not to sound breathless after the scramble through her bag. "Kat's Dogs, can I help you?"

"Uh… yes. I found your number on Yelp?"

Reese had to work very hard to suppress a smile. The voice on the other end of the line belonged to Finch.

"Ok. New client. Are you looking to set up a regular schedule?"

"No, actually. I've had a regular dog walker for some time, but he's… visiting family… in Anchorage."

"So you need temporary services?"

"Yes. I thought I could manage on my own, but…" as if on cue, Bear began barking loudly.

"Fantastic. When do you need me?"

"Do you have any availability this afternoon?"

Kat's face fell slightly.

"This afternoon? Well… Tuesdays are usually my days off, and…"

"Please. I'm willing to pay a premium. I shudder to think what Bear might do if I leave him cooped up all day long." Finch, on the other end of the line, was eyeing the dog pointedly. He wasn't sure this was at all untrue.

"…Ok. I guess I can squeeze you in. Can I get your name?" She began rummaging for a pen and paper. Reese pushed his placemat in front of her as she surfaced with the writing utensil in hand. He tried not to obviously notice as she scrawled out the name "Harold Hawke" on the placemat, followed by an address, before quickly folding the paper and stuffing it in her bag.

"That's great. I'll be there in an hour." She said finally, before hanging up and tucking her phone away.

"Well…" Reese said, finishing his soup at last, "it looks like this is my cue to leave you."

"If I run into trouble again, how do I find you?" Kat asked.

"You don't." Reese replied.

"I thought you said I'd see you again." Kat pressed.

"I never said that." Reese corrected, "But, chances are, you'll run into me again sooner or later."


End file.
